JEAN BRYANT
Journalism career spanned nearly three decades at Pittsburgh Press, Post-Gazette
Jean Bryant came to Pittsburgh for work, but it was her unwavering desire to uplift and inspire Black youth that was her true calling.
It’s something that Pittsburghers will never forget.
Bryant, the creator of the Miss Black Teenage Pageant, and later the Mister African American, died on Wednesday, Dec. 13, at the North Hills Skilled Nursing and Rehab Center, where she was recovering from a fall she suffered in August. She was 91.
Throughout the Pittsburgh area, and even in other parts of the country, people who knew Bryant described her as “fearless,” a “risk-taker,” “genuine,” and “motherly.”
The woman who was bold enough to wear gold hair before most anyone else in town. The woman who, even though she could have tooted her own horn as a Black woman working at the Pittsburgh Press in 1972, spoke out about the lack of Black journalists in town. She spoke out against the lack of opportunities for Black girls being showcased, as their White counterparts were all over TV in pageants for “Miss America this” and “Miss America that.”
They told her Pittsburgh was a “shot and a beer town,” and having a Black teenage pageant would never work here.
Well, that’s why they called Bryant fearless.
She did it anyway.
JEAN BRYANT, FRONT LEFT, IN THE EARLY DAYS OF THE MISS BLACK TEENAGE PAGEANT
In 1973, her newspaper, the Pittsburgh Press, wrote that applications were being accepted “for the first Miss Black Teenage Allegheny County beauty pageant…open to girls 13 to 16 who have a good appearance and a performing talent.”
“The standards of beauty our society has adhered to in the past didn’t encompass the beauty of Black women,” Bryant was quoted in the story.
Renee Moore recalled being on that stage in 1973 with, among others, Tamara Tunie. They stood there, hoping to be the first Miss Black Teenage Allegheny County. Moore won. Both Moore and Tunie credit Bryant and their participation in the pageant in helping their confidence rise to the next level. Tunie didn’t turn out too bad…she’s the famous actress who starred in the soap opera “As The World Turns” and as the medical examiner in NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.”
There are hundreds of other Black girls who, between ages 12 and 17, were on that pageant stage, whether it was held at Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall in Oakland, or at a local church auditorium, and continue to cherish their participation in it, years, decades later.
Bryant’s longtime friend, Joyce Meggerson-Moore, Ph.D., was a judge in most of the pageants. “She always wanted them (the girls) to be the best at whatever they were going to be in life,” Meggerson-Moore told the New Pittsburgh Courier, Dec. 18.
JEAN BRYANT
Bryant’s motto to the girls was to always “Wear The C.A.P.,” with the “C.A.P.” standing for “Confidence, Awareness and Pride.”
“When she (Bryant) was sick in the last few days, I said, ‘Alright Jean, you got to ‘wear that c.a.p.’ You should have seen how she changed her body language while she was sitting in that bed,” Meggerson-Moore said.
About 50 girls, but sometimes nearly 80, would be a part of each pageant, which usually would be held annually on Mother’s Day. It was a grand production, complete with pageant directors, the most elegant of gowns, and proud parents, grandparents and friends filling the stands.
Meggerson-Moore called the pageants “polished. You would have thought you were watching one of those Miss America pageants on television,” she told the Courier.
As the years went on, the Miss Black Teenage Pageant became one of the premier events in Pittsburgh. After all, in a city that never really had a huge Black population, this was the time for young Black girls to be showcased, for them to see that they could be whatever they wanted to be in life. Today, those same girls are doctors, lawyers, business owners, actresses, and most importantly, changemakers.
“One thing I remember is the positive experience and friendships that I made,” said Teresa Hawthorne, a well-known vocalist in Pittsburgh and CEO of Turn Up Your Life Motivation, LLC. Hawthorne was a contestant in the pageant in the mid-1980s. “You become a part of a larger sisterhood among the different girls over the years.”
Hawthorne told the Courier she had Bryant’s blessing recently to concoct a pageant of her own that would continue inspiring Black and brown girls to be their best. Hawthorne said Bryant, who had a great sense of humor, has been “an inspiration to so many women and young girls over the years. Her grace, style and mission to empower young ladies on how to show up in life as confident, respectful individuals has always inspired me.”
In 1993, Bryant created with fellow Post-Gazette reporter LaMont Jones “Mister African American,” a showcase of young Black boys, similar to the Miss Black Teenage Pageant. Bryant said she created it due to the sharp increase in homicides by Black men on Black men in Pittsburgh in the early ‘90s. It ran for 10 years, while the Miss Black Teenage Pageant ran for more than 30 years.
Brian Cook Sr., a former Pittsburgh Black Media Federation president and current Director of Communications and Marketing for Central Catholic High School in Oakland, participated in Mister African American in 1997, while a junior at Central Catholic. Through his participation in Mister African American, it helped him receive a full Board Of Governors Scholarship to Clarion University, where he later earned his bachelor’s degree.
And who was there to see him graduate from college? Jean Bryant.
“Your program is very effective in the African American community, especially in today’s society,” is how Cook’s letter to Bryant some 20 years ago read, revealed on a documentary that was produced by WQED-TV on Bryant. “I want to thank you for helping me achieve success. I was thrilled to see you at my graduation. Mrs. Bryant, it is a pleasure to be your friend. I love you.”
A native of Roselle, N.J., Bryant first worked at the New Jersey Afro-American, which was based in Newark. In 1972, she was hired to be a reporter at the Pittsburgh Press, where she worked for 20 years before moving to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, where she retired in 1999.
But when Meggerson-Moore, who serves as chairperson of the Board of Directors for New Horizon Theater, met Bryant in 1980, it didn’t have anything to do with journalism. Bryant was already a resident of Stanton Heights, and Meggerson-Moore had just moved into the neighborhood. Basically, Bryant recruited Meggerson-Moore to help her in keeping Stanton Heights a great place to live, as many African Americans who had professional backgrounds called Stanton Heights home.
When developers tried to “commercialize” parts of Stanton Heights, Bryant “wasn’t about to have that,” Meggerson-Moore told the Courier. “We would fight various issues down at the City-County Building. Jean was always passionate about what she was doing.”
Bryant would go door-to-door with flyers, seemingly determined at all costs to fight for her people. “She would always say, ‘so goes Stanton Heights, so goes the city,’” Meggerson-Moore said. “She was trying to say, if you let this (neighborhood) go and you’re not passionate about improving the neighborhood, then you’re not really interested in the whole picture. She was interested in the whole picture. She was interested in the whole picture of those girls, too.”
JEAN BRYANT was a reporter for The Pittsburgh Press and Post-Gazette, and helmed the Ms. Black Teen Pageant in Pittsburgh for 36 years.
Bryant, a fixture with the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation, won numerous awards over the years. She was the legacy honoree for the Courier’s “Women of Excellence” awards ceremony in 2012. On July 30, 2016, the Black Political Empowerment Project awarded Bryant with its “Thermostat For Change” Award. The award read, in part: “For your phenomenal commitment to youth through your 36 years in presenting the Miss Black Teenage Pageant and 10 years presenting Mister African American…you made a difference in the lives of so many young people.”
Visitation for Ms. Bryant will be held from 4 to 8 p.m. Jan. 2 at White Memorial Chapel in Wilkinsburg. A service is also set to take place on Jan. 3 at 11 a.m. at Macedonia Baptist Church in the Hill District.
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